Well, at the risk of sounding pathetic, here is what I have scaled down to:

Cell: Tracfone, prepaid, the airtime and minutes are always right there on the screen. If you will run out of either and things are a bit tight this week, just don’t use it. I keep buying my minutes as little as 30 at a time which is what I can afford (they double to 60). Buy whatever you can afford. The minutes aren’t the cheapest but you have total control over how much it will cost you. No contracts.

Landline: Magicjack! Spring for the Magicjack Plus. It has its very own tiny computer so it is not affected by what is going on with your computer. Plug it into a wall outlet and connect it to your internet with an ethernet cable. I have had flawless connections since upgrading. Cost: $70 for the device and $20/year.

Internet+ I am giving up my cable internet because the bastards at Charter won’t let me downgrade to internet+cheapskate cable. So I am going back to at&t dsl internet (~$50 after promo period) + Charter cheapskate cable (~about $30/month for the 4 major networks, weather, shopping, and come-to-Jesus channels).

So,
Cell cost: whatever I can afford.
Landline cost: $70 for device, unlimited local and long distance, $20/year.
DSL internet: $50/month
Cheapskate cable: $30/month.

I fucking can’t stand Verizon. When I lived over near Beverly Hills, I had Pac Bell which was bought out by those cocksucker dillholes over at SBC (Texas Bell), so my phone bill which used to be a flat $25 a month gradually rose to $30 then $35 a month, also tacking on the non-ironically named Billing Statement (BS) fee, no shit, because I had AT&T for my long distance carrier so they started charging a buck for that which gradually rose to 3 bucks a month, may they burn in hell. So in 2005 I had to move because of problems with the building, moved to a different neighborhood in LA called Mar Vista, which was nice, but for some reason, Verizon was the sole landline provider, so I had to switch. So those cocksucking assholes managed to even out-dick SBC by giving me the exact same service & features as SBC, but socking me $30 extra per month. I put up with it for 9 months before I kicked their worthless aases to the curb for Vonage & a return to a flat fee of $25 a month. Fuck Verizon up the ass with a giant bag of walnuts, all those dickholes can go screaming down to hell on a runaway handcart.

Funny side story, I once made an SBC telemarketing operator cry because she tried to sell me high-speed internet DSL through them as an add-on service to my landline. She tried to hand me some bullshit about DSL being faster than cable to which I informed her that the max bandwidth possible with DSL was a measly 1.75Mbs download, while I already had more than 6.0Mbs with my cable provider. So she came back with some malarkey about SBC having unmatched customer service, to which I replied, “But wasn’t your company recently penalized by the FCC for double-billing customers, charging customers for services for several months after they had supposedly cancelled them, & a host of other complaints against your company to which you had to settle a class-action lawsuit in addition?” There was this stunned silence on the other end of the phone for at least 15 seconds, then when she began speaking again, it was in this halting, jerky voice that told me she was choking back tears. It was the best phone call I ever had from SBC. I told her that if SBC wanted my business, they’d better stop lying to their customers, & to pass that onto her manager, & up the chain to the VPs.

We were going to switch to Verizon Internet because of a really cheap introductory offer, plus I could keep my old e-mail address for $5/mo.

So then the installer arrived, and when he heard about the “old e-mail address for $5/month,” he burst out laughing. “Those guys will say anything to make a sale, won’t they?”

So we didn’t switch. And not because we’re delighted with Comcast.

I’m dreading replacing my old phone, a Motorola “industrial” phone that I paid a pretty penny for seven or so years ago.  It’s held up pretty well, considering that any other phone I’d had lasted a year and a half before burning out.  I bought such a durable phone because I was doing some grunt work in a warehouse which involved me moving transfile boxes on a rolling staircase in a room with a 21 foot ceiling, and I wanted a phone that could conceivably take a fall.  I could have used that phone to drive nails.  Sadly, the rubberized coating on the phone is worn down.  You can bet your bippy any smartphone I buy is going into the most durable case I can find.

Most accurate comment I have heard is while waiting in line for “customer service”. After listening to the various complaints for several minutes, the guy behind me pointed out the window at a competitors store across the way. His comment? “If you really hate these guys you can switch… and in three months you’ll hate those guys just as much.”

“Free Market Capitalism” F Yeah!!!